1. Field
The present application discloses an ice maker and a refrigerator having the same.
2. Background
Currently available large-sized refrigerators have ice makers which are capable of making a certain shape of ice pieces. In such ice makers, cool air is supplied to a certain amount of water having been supplied to an ice making container. Once the water has been converted into ice, the ice pieces in the ice making container are transferred to an ice storage container by an ice separating apparatus so as to be stored therein.
In such ice makers, the ice making container is installed in a location within the refrigerator where the temperature is maintained at or below 0° C., which is the freezing point of water (hereafter, abbreviated as the freezing point). The water in the container is frozen by cool air. The water is usually first frozen from at an area that is directly in contact with the cool air supplied into the ice maker. The ice formation then progresses toward a central area of the ice container More specifically, the water in the container is first cooled by coming in contact with the peripheral cool air, which usually means at an inner circumferential surface of the ice making container. The water then continues to be frozen toward the center of the ice making container
In most existing ice makers, the water supplied to the ice making container contains a certain amount of air. Some of the air is separated from the water while the water in the ice making container is frozen. However, some of the air is trapped in the ice in the form of bubbles in the ice. Ideally, one would like all of the air to be removed from the water before it turns to ice so that no bubbles are formed in the ice. But during the ice making procedure in existing ice makers, the water surface is first frozen, as discussed above, and accordingly all of the air in the water cannot be removed. This is the reason that air bubbles remain trapped in the ice, and this is why the ice is formed as opaque ice pieces.